"Huh?" Wally said.

"Think...if we're all bein' tugged toward our dimension," Logan said, "the planes are shiftin'.... Only Frost and you can even see both.... The rest of us are just doin' things between two worlds.... I think all of us from one world are goin' to have to split off and look two separate ways."

"But...all of you are way stronger than us," Forge said. "I mean, look at your Rogue: she's really strong and can fly, and you have Storm, and Wolverine, and we just have me and Domino here and Cyclops--okay, he's pretty tough, but then it's just Rogue and Emma."

"Thanks," Younger Rogue muttered.

"I hate to say it, but I think Wolverine might be right," Emma said. "We can't keep switching and hope to find anyone. If separating means we'd stay more firmly foot in one place, it might be all we can do. Perhaps it would stop pulling me and Mr. West both ways if we stuck with one group."

"I mean, we do gravitate towards whoever we're bonded with," Wally said. "I hate it, but I guess we can take care of this.... Okay, if we separate, though, I think we should do different things.... We should try to find Sinister. We know he's backing Apocalypse up. And he'll have a band of bad guys with him. You guys should try to find the prisoners. Forge can break them out, right? So it makes more sense for your team to. Besides, Scottie, you'll want to find your team, and they'll probably trust you more than us. Our Scott will know what's up, so no worries about him."

"I'd worry about 'im a little," Logan said. "But if he's at all up on it, he'll know what happened by now. Hopefully he won't do anythin' too dumb."

"Real vote of confidence you have in your Cyclops, there," Domino said. "He must be even dumber than this one."

She got a warning look from Emma at that.

"I guess that's our only option," Scott said. "If it's the only way. How do we know Sinister won't be in the prison?"

"He might be, but if we split up anyway, this should work," Wally said. "We good? Morph, I guess you're with us.... You're adjusted to this world huh? And I'm bonded with these X-men. Sorry, other X-men...just haven't been there, you know?"

"No, go," Emma agreed. "If you run into Sinister they'll need your help. He can block mutation, can't he?... Or is that someone else?" She rubbed her head.

"No, that was right," Older Rogue said. "But...I guess...this could be it, then.... I mean..."

She sighed. "Who knows if we'll find our way back to the same plane?"

Silence.

"Well...good luck, then," Storm said. "I hope you all find your way home, and if this ends well, at least we'll know you're safe. It's been a honor working with you also."

"Yeah...well, thanks," Scott said. "I'm hoping we'll find everyone though. I mean...you guys deserve to get your lives back too."

"We'll get them, Scottie. Now let's get goin'!" Logan held his claw up. "Enough chit chat. We'll take the right, you go left. Let's see if this works."

They split.

[Here we go again.]

* * *

It took maybe five minutes for things to go wrong.

The 20-year group of X-men didn't have much to go on.

But away from the others, Emma did seem to feel a little less divided.

She was slowing, though.

Domino shook her head at her, but all she said was, "Maybe with my luck, we'll actually find it."

It was funny, because right after that...they found a new winding hallway that seemed to be going...upward?

"Okay...I'm 90% sure that was not in the layout before," Forge said.

"Why is it going up? This place didn't have a second floor," Younger Rogue wondered.

"It didn't before." Scott was catching on.

The whole zipper metaphor came back to him.

Emma looked at the sloping walkway, and just sighed.

"I'm never going to be able to make that," she said.

"You want help, or are you just giving up?" Domino said.

It took all of Emma's self control not to snap at her.

Swallowing her pride with gritted teeth, she said, "If you would be so kind...."

"Can't lose our telepath." Forge tried to make it sound better. "Kind of wish we had the other Rogue here though.... Super strength would be great for going up those stairs."

"Forge, shut up," Younger Rogue said.

"Only you, Rogue, would be jealous of yourself," Domino said.

"Maybe you just don't have a double to worry about, huh?" Rogue said.

"All right, enough of this." Scott took Emma by the arm and hoisted her up. "We have to hurry. We don't have a guide now, so..."

"Just like old times," Forge said. "Blindly rushing into danger, wondering if it's going to work or not. If Wolverine was here, it would be just like before."

"If he was here, you'd be moving before he kicked you," Emma muttered.

Forge started moving faster.

All of them hurried up the ramp as fast as they could manage.

Domino went first.... Hopefully luck would favor her if she ran into trouble.

But oddly...still nothing.

It was quiet as a tomb.

Given that it was Apocalypse...maybe that made sense.

But then she found a window in the side of it, and she gasped. "Ahh, guys...look."

They all joined her.

To their shock, they saw they were not at ground level, or even anywhere near it.

The one they were in seemed as far up as the Empire State Building almost, and out the windows they saw other buildings, shaped like pyramids, and floating.

"Oh my--" Emma gasped. "Just like before...the planes.... We changed.... We're in a different dimension than before now..."

"Is this good?" Forge asked.

"I guess if it's the one our team is in..." Scott mused.

"And...how do we get down?" Domino said. "Last I checked, none of us in this group could fly."

Crud...that was true.

"I guess we'll find that out when we have to," Scott said. "There has to be a way down...a ship or something."

"I think we know why it's so empty," Rogue said. "No way that many people would come up here. This is so creepy.... I hate Merging. It's like a video game that changes its scene every few minutes instead of every level.... You can't get anything straight."

They kept going.

Finally they reached the top of the ramp.

They seemed to be in the heart of the pyramid now, based on the appearance of the room it led them into.

It wasn't just wide, open space though.... There were levels, and floors. Machinery was everyone.

It was far more advanced than what Forge had seen before.

"Okay...question," Forge said. "Why wasn't I here before? I was in the other dimension yesterday."

Emma was leaning on the wall now, and she looked sleepy.

"Isn't it obvious?" she said, still somehow a know-it-all. "Because it's worse since yesterday.... We had hoped it was just getting closer to Apocalypse, but...clearly it's not that. It's...getting so close, we can switch like nothing. Like you were switching that other Forge, but now instead of some people, we're switching dimensions themselves...and that has to be worse."

"Yeah, that does sound worse," Domino said. "All of us are gonna be feeling that difference before long...and I haven't even gotten to punch Quicksilver yet.... This is not good." She looked up. "But if I was going to bet--and I'd probably win if I did-- I'd say that Mr. God Complex himself is way up there at the top of this thing. Or that our team--your team, really--is. Who could break out of this prison? Without a ship, you'd have to be able to fly, and none of them can."

"So how do we get up there? Walking is gonna take forever," Rogue said.

Then they headed to back up the hallway.

Someone on a flying, disc-like hoverboard passed by, looking at some handheld device.

They zipped around a corner and into one of the hallways.

"Well..." Domino said, "I think that answers that question."

* * *

The 50-year group went and found that their path was taking them downward now.

"I guess this did work," Wally said, "if we're seeing a change now.... Hey, guys, where's Hank?"

They all suddenly realized he wasn't there.

"When...when did we see him last?" Rogue asked.

"I don't know," Storm said. "Wasn't he outside with us when Dust was there?"

"Was he?" Morph said. "I don't remember anything with him since we got out of the sewers..."

They all thought.

"I can't remember," Logan said, spooked. "I can't remember when I last saw 'im."

"Wally, please tell us this is just a symptom of the Merging," Storm said, "and does not mean that he's...well..."

Wally rubbed his head. "Now I have a headache.... I'm not sure.... I...can't really say one way or the other. He's just...he just kind of blurs with the other missing people...but I know he was with us after Caliban.... I don't remember him being there at the house though."

"How could he vanish without us noticing?" Storm asked.

Wally shuddered. "I don't know. Everything is so creepy right now.... Maybe it's one of those anomaly things.... Maybe if you vanish here...we just don't notice it. Between timelines...I can't say exactly what it is...but at least we finally did notice, so there's hope, right?"

"How is that hope?" Logan said. "Hank would be in trouble."

"Technically, Logan, we're in trouble too," Morph said. "For all we know, he's better off without us. We're in the belly of the beast.... I think we're just gonna have to keep going. We can't look for him."

"I should have known I didn't smell 'im," Logan said. "I knew somethin' was off this whole time..." He frowned. "Hank...how could we just not notice...?"

"It's not your fault, Logan." Storm put a hand on his arm. "All of us are deeply confused now.... I'm sure he'll turn up when we find the others.... He's here somewhere."

[Who noticed he was gone?--Totally planned it that way--not like I'd just use it because it was easier than fixing it--]

* * *

Domino easily shot someone off one of the hoverboards, and then Rogue knocked them out.

"Well, that wasn't so hard," she said.

"A little too easy," Domino said. "Where is the army coming for us?"

Emma put a hand to her head. 

"I wonder if we just don't realize they're here," she said. "I have a feeling they're watching us."

"Who knows...? They seemed like they were watching us before," Scott said.

Emma closed her eyes.

Suddenly she saw flashes.

Fire in her mind.

Apocalypse...

A dark room.

And then searing pain...

She fell to the floor.

"Emma?" Scott got down.

"Oh, not again," Domino said. "The busted telepath is really short circuiting."

Scott gave her such a look that she shut up.

"Emma...can you hear me?" he asked.

Emma blinked.

Something was wrong.... She hadn't had that kind of episode in a long time, it felt like. 

The other kind sure, but this one...was like before.... Was she being attacked?

It was getting so bad now, she couldn't think...

And after that always came the memory loss.

"Hey," Forge said. "Do you guys hear something?"

They all listened.

Coming over the floors that led up to the top of the pyramid, they heard metallic running noises.

Looking up, they saw some metallic clad soldiers were on their way--or were they robots?

"You know, the tech in this dimension is way different from how it was before," Forge noted.

"Oh, you think?" Domino said. "I hope these adjustments you made actually work, Stud."

She shot at one and hit them, and they fell off the walkway and to the ground.

"Well...looks like it worked to me," Rogue said.

The soldier got up and turned to them angrily.

"Or not," Rogue said.

"Hold up." Domino frowned. "I know that mutant. That's one from Genosha. I mean...our Genosha."

The mutant threw some kind of flying discs at them.

More mutant soldiers came running down the walkway at them.

One was Pyro, from before.

He shot fire into the air.

Domino shot at him and knocked him back too.

"We need a plan!" she said.

Scott was trying to get Emma up.

"We have to move." He was pulling her shoulders.

Emma blinked at him in confusion. "What's going on?"

"Uh oh..." Scott muttered. "Not now.... Emma, you have to remember!"

Emma's head began to clear a little.

"It's a trick," she said strangely, reaching up to grab Scott's arm. "Scott, it's a trick."

"What's a trick?" Scott shot one of the soldiers away before they could even throw something at him.

"This," Emma said, sitting up. "It's--" She broke off and went dead silent.

Scott didn't understand, but he didn't have a whole lot of time to figure it out.

He stood up, firing at more of the soldiers coming.

"I don't get it." Forge fired at them also. "Nothing all the way till now, and it's like they're waiting for us."

While they weren't looking, Emma slowly got to her feet, staring straight ahead at the scene like it puzzled her.

Then she turned to look at the back wall.

Frowning, she walked that direction.

The others had to retreat a little, looking for cover.

Rogue tripped over the edge of the hoverboard.

Then--worst of all.

The board suddenly moved and smacked her in the head, sending her back.

The others looked up.

Magneto--indubitably the one they knew, based on Scott's memory of the other one--was hovering over the floor and looking down at them.

"Hello, X-men," he said.

"Uh oh..." Forge mumbled.

Domino held up her guns, and they floated out of her hands.

"Don't insult me," Magneto said. "Please.... Well, I had wondered when you all would show up. Welcome to the Inner Most Sanctum of the Fortress. Like it? I helped design it."

"That would explain the metal," Forge said weakly.

"The X-men with metal body parts, the deadshot who can't fight without a weapon, and the girl who has to touch someone to be useful," Magneto said. "Not a great line up, Cyclops. Were all the useful members of your team busy?--oh right, they're with us."

"So...you really are working for him," Scott said darkly. "Are you mad? Even for you, Magneto, this is insane."

"Is it?" Magneto said.

"Hey, didn't your daughter get taken?" Forge said.

Magneto frowned. "Wanda is safe enough."

"He let her," Domino realized, looking at Forge. "The scumbag."

"Big talk for someone who worked for me up until recently," Magneto said. "But then, you were on my disappointing son's team."

"And that disappointing son is working for you now, isn't he?" Domino said.

"Correction, he's working for Apocalypse," Magneto said. "I don't make the hiring decisions around here. But I was smart enough to see the writing on the wall. All of you must know you're fighting a losing battle...and you don't even have a telepath anymore."

Scott suddenly looked back.

Emma!

She was standing at the far end of the floor.

"Emma? What are you doing?" he called.

Emma made no answer at all.

One of the Tears opened in the wall, like a doorway, and Emma went inside without even a looking back at them.

"What...just happened?" Forge asked.

"Miss Frost knows what to do now," Magneto said, smiling oddly. "Surely you saw this coming..."

"Saw...what coming?" Rogue sat up weakly.

"That our dear Emma was helping us the entire time," Magneto said, as if it was obvious.

"That's ridiculous." Scott was angry. "Where did you take her?"

"I don't control those things...telepaths do," Magneto said.

He let that sink in.

"No," Scott insisted. "You're lying. Emma is on our side."

"Well, from what I hear, she's a very convincing liar," Magneto said flatly. "But, if you really want to discuss this...how do you think we always found you?"

"You tracked her," Scott said. "Using the other telepaths."

"Is that what she told you?" Magneto said.

Rogue gasped. "Wait a minute..."

"Don't listen to him," Scott said. "This is stupid. Emma's been broken for weeks. She couldn't have been signaling them at all. Even trying was hurting her."

"Yes...when she was trying for your side," Magneto said. "I assure you, Emma has given us relevant information this whole time. If you don't believe me...well, I really can't prove it. I'm no mind reader. But we know all about you, Cyclops. About all of you. Including your DJ friends.... I suppose they've met my counterpart? I've been looking forward to finding out why he didn't just crush them on the spot."

"Maybe they're hard to kill," Domino said.

"Well, you had better hope so. I hear one is going up against Apocalypse right now, as we speak," Magneto said. "Or was.... The time difference is a little much to get used to at first, isn't it?"

"Is he talking about Shine?" Domino said. "She wouldn't be that stupid, right?"

"Apocalypse himself went out to stop her mad, little diatribe about our plan," Magneto said. "Unbelievable nerve and arrogance to think she could pull something like that.... All of you must have known what would happen."

"Even so, I don't believe you," Scott said. "You're just trying to get us to think Emma was working for you. You can't prove it."

"I see." Magneto regarded him coolly. "Well, we all know when you don't want to see a thing, Cyclops, you refuse to see it. I suppose you'll come around. If you get the chance."

Metal came and lashed around all of them suddenly.

"But for now, I think you should get a front row seat," Magneto said. "And the rest of your friends are waiting for you eagerly, I assure you. I really can't believe you came here, knowing it was a trap. Frost certainly played her cards well."

"Scott," Rogue said, "maybe he's telling the truth.... It sounds like her."

"He's lying," Scott insisted. "It's convenient to blame Emma--she's not here!"

"Then why did she just leave?" Rogue said.

Scott hesitated.

"I bet it was another trance," he said. "And you expect me to buy this? Emma almost jumped out a window last night. She couldn't have survived that."

"She could have, in her diamond form," Magneto said.

"Which she can't use," Scott said.

"According to her," Magneto said.

"No...there were a bunch of times she could have used it and didn't," Scott said. "When she needed to."

"So she said.... We really could go all day long about this," Magneto said. "But I'm not really interested in convincing you that your love affair was not all based on a sham. Although what would Jean say?"

Scott only got angry at that. "It was not like that."

"Hey, Slick," Domino said, "don't answer him on that. For our sakes as well as his, literally no one wants to know."

"But it's not--" Scott began.

"More importantly, you're just egging him on," Domino interrupted him.

Scott stopped.

"I really don't care," Magneto said. "It only amazes me how people refuse to see the obvious, that is all. But come." [You know, coming from him...🤦‍♀️]

He flew them up the ramp. "I have other matters to attend to. Sinister was right to send me. You bumbling buffoons couldn't catch the smaller ones when you had the chance, let alone the mature X-men."

The "buffoons" of soldiers followed, frowning at him, but not arguing.

"We're so screwed," Forge muttered.

"And don't think I don't know about that Talis," Magneto said. "Apocalypse will be glad to get it finally."

"You never gave that back!?" Domino said sharply.

"He never took it," Forge said. "I'm starting to think Morph doesn't like having that thing on him for some reason."

[Can't imagine why--it's not like it traumatized him by dragging him and his friends through time against their will or anything crazy like that.]

* * *

Emma stepped out of the doorway and into a room full of machines and other scientific equipment tools and paraphernalia.

"Ah...Miss Frost." Sinister looked up. "Right on time."

Emma blinked at him. "What...? How...how did you--?"

"I can't believe you came this far on your own," Sinister said. 

"I don't understand," Emma said. "How did you get me to do that...? You're no telepath."

Sinister shrugged. "Apocalypse isn't the only one with toys."

Emma looked behind her. "So...this is the part where you tell me you were waiting for this the whole time. You can spare me--I already know."

"And what else do you know?" Sinister said.

"I know you're mad," Emma said.

Sinister sneered, "None of you understand. Well, I really couldn't expect you to, I suppose. Come with me. I've been dying to show you my lab."

"I'm sorry, we've only met about twice, and both those times I was trying to rescue Scott and Jean from you," Emma said. "We're not friends. And if you expect me to come with you, willingly, you're madder still."

"Is that so?" Sinister said. "What if I said that I could tell you why your power hasn't been working?"

Silence.

Emma frowned at him. "I don't believe it... Like you told Warren, no doubt."

"Whatever you think of my methods, I did as a I promised him," Sinister said. "And I never lie about knowing the answers for something. Besides...hasn't it occurred to you, why you're this way at all?"

He pressed a button.

Searing pain went through Emma's head, and she doubled over for a minute, then it passed.

Looking up, she saw Sinister leering at her.

"You..." she said, in a tone of both recognition and dread.

"Yes..." Sinister said. "Though I must credit the Phoenix force... I would never have successfully invaded a telepath's mind that hadn't been so damaged to begin with, not like I have. And I must say...it showed us a lot. Without your contributions, Frost, we never could have subdued the others so fast. You held the key to getting past their defenses...and you never knew, did you? Knew that we put you back together wrong on purpose."

Emma's mouth dropped open. "You...you what?" 

"Follow me," Sinister said.

Emma had no real choice.